7x3x3 ft Tempered vs 7x3x2.5 ft ordinary glass tank

[Lepisosteus]

Who knew my two lines of work would be brought up in the same thread on MFK. Nickel sulfides and acrylic!!

I have seen acrylic aquariums buffed with fish inside with the water level lowered to the point of the scratches. I don’t recall if it was with the use of novus products or with wet sand paper only. It was in a thread by J.T from back in the day.

I have heard of buffing acrylic aquariums while full of water as well. With further research I found this video

In my opinion, if you are scratching an acrylic aquarium then you are doing poor/improper maintenance.

 

[Blakewater]

Ive run acrylic aquariums for 4 years+ and the only scratching that ended up happening was from me when I would lean against the tank with something pointy during maintenance. Rocks, sand, wood, debris, etc. never did anything that was noticeable. If youre severely scratching your tank up fast with acrylic then glass is definitely the type of tank for you. Personally, I put more scratches in my glass aquariums than in my acrylic because I know the acrylic is sensitive to sharp edges whereas glass is wishy washy

 

[Lepisosteus]

As for the purpose of this thread. I would not go with tempered glass. As pointed out it does shatter. In my opinion spontaneous breakage is not the worry but a point applied pressure that normally would result in a chip now results in a shattered panel.

When I was working in a hockey rink few years back we removed one of the large glass panels above the boards. 3/4” piece of tempered glass around 6x4’. We must have placed it down on a small stone as it exploded in our hands. Obviously it was able to handle blunt force very well as it received multiple 150mph hockey pucks produced by my shot but catching the edge broke it like nothing.

I would go with plate glass, at least 5/8” thick with both top and bottom eurobraced. Bottom panel minimum 5/8” thick.

 

[Dre07]

Thanks for all the input, sadly acrylic is not easily available here. And it would be very expensive to get that much for a large tank. I will probably be looking into getting 3/4" glass instead and brace it properly. Maybe sticking with the 7x3x3 size probably try 8x3x3 based on the safety factor chart on sprucepets

 

[RD.]

In my opinion spontaneous breakage is not the worry but a point applied pressure that normally would result in a chip now results in a shattered panel.

Somehow I missed these latest posts. A big YES to your comment above. In many of the "spontaneous" breakage reports, it seems clear that there was a manufacturing design flaw in how the glass was sealed & supported in the frame. Pressure on the edge - glass goes boom! I believe this was the main cause of the oven door issues. Same goes in an aquarium. A small piece of sharp gravel under a 40 pound boulder - boom! Or at least the possibility of it. Call it whatever you want, the end result is still the same.

 

[adamsfishes]

Somehow I missed these latest posts. A big YES to your comment above. In many of the "spontaneous" breakage reports, it seems clear that there was a manufacturing design flaw in how the glass was sealed & supported in the frame. Pressure on the edge - glass goes boom! I believe this was the main cause of the oven door issues. Same goes in an aquarium. A small piece of sharp gravel under a 40 pound boulder - boom! Or at least the possibility of it. Call it whatever you want, the end result is still the same.

This happened to Joey Mullen (as youtuber) recently. A small piece of gravel was on the stand in the corner of the aquarium, and the bottom cracked. He managed to save the Vieja in the tank. It was a customaquariums 4x2x2 120.